


The Negative

by LadyKatie512



Category: Devil May Cry
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Based off a fan theory, Devil May Cry 5, F/M, POV Third Person Limited, Possible Spoilers, Strangers to Lovers, This is really wordy I'm sorry, Written before the game released, also eventual smut, maybe some fluff?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-01
Updated: 2019-03-01
Packaged: 2019-11-07 07:34:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,911
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17956298
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyKatie512/pseuds/LadyKatie512
Summary: V had plans, ulterior motives, he had an agenda. There wasn't room for error, there was no room for variables. Regardless, that didn't stop their paths from crossing.





	The Negative

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first FanFic for this fandom. I based this off of a fan theory I watched while spiraling down the V obsession rabbit hole. No, it's not that V is Vergil, and no I won't say which theory until later on for the sake of ambiguity. Also, this chapter is really wordy with little dialogue, but that's what I get for trying to cram this into four chapters.
> 
> (Title and chapter titles are from a Demon Hunter song, The Negative)

It was late by the time she had left the company. She wasn’t the last for sure, their summer production of Sleeping Beauty was looming over everyone’s heads. Still, it was late enough to make Joy thankful for the pepper spray tucked away in her gym bag. She could have caught a bus but her studio flat was only a few blocks away, and it was a nice spring night for mid-May. The only reason she was wearing her over sized sweater was due to modesty, not wanting to walk around the city in just a pair of leggings and a thin sports bra. To compromise, she pushed each sleeve up her arms to her elbows.

About fifteen minutes from her flat, with her ear buds in her ears, she heard her phone ding and fished it out of her gym bag, finding a text from another girl in the company, Clair. “Erin’s buying drinks downtown!” it said, with two cute smiley face emojis. They only made Joy sigh. It wasn’t even the weekend. Joy had been looking forward to her bed since the sun had set a few hours ago, and she definitely wasn’t up for mid-week bar hopping. Instead, Joy chose to ignore the text, shoving her phone back into her bag.

By the time Joy rounded the street corner where her flat was, she had received another two texts, but hadn’t bothered checking them. It was most likely Clair begging for a response, or one of the other girls asking her to tag along.

There was a woman smoking and leaning against the corner of the building Joy was walking passed, and she gave her a wide berth. In doing so, however, Joyce found that the ground shifted below her trainers and she was thrown into the nearby street lamp on the corner. Grabbing into it before she lost her balance, Joy thought for a moment that the woman had somehow tripped her and reached for the pepper spray in her bag, but then noticed that the woman had been thrown about as well, one of her hands on the building to steady herself. The pair looked at each other briefly before Joy pulled her hand out of her bag and removed her ear buds. Her music was replaced with a dull rumble and she realized that there mush be an earthquake.

Less violently than what had tripped Joy, the ground began to shake and, still holding onto the lamp post, Joy looked up to see the lights rattling dangerously about. She let go and quickly moved to the middle of the street as one of the lights fell where she had previously stood. Feeling her heart pick up speed, Joy looked up and down the street to make sure she wasn’t about to get struck with a car, and noticed the woman had joined her, staying away from the nearby buildings. Besides that, there was no actual cover for them.

Below, the road cracked and Joy was thrown into a nearby car, the alarm going off. The woman next to her cursed loudly, more so at the fact that she had lost her cigarette. While the woman tried to retrieve her lost smoke, Joy was more preoccupied with what had broken through the street. Right in the middle of the road it looked like a massive root had sprouted, making it’s way up through the asphalt and down the street. The only resemblance it had to a root was it’s dark, fibrous texture, covered in earth and asphalt, but there were an uncountable amount of large, red, undulating pustules running it’s length, and if Joy wasn’t mistaken, they were glowing faintly.

“What in the hell is that?” the other woman seemed to finally notice, deeming her cigarette a lost cause.

“I— I don't…” Joy looked from the wicked looking sprout to the woman with only an open mouth and wide eyes as a response, she was just as shocked. Whatever it was, the woman didn’t seem keen on sticking around. As the ground settled, she began to run down the street. Joy watched for a moment, before deciding to follow her cautious initiative, since it was in the same direction as her flat. Unfortunately, the unsettling root had emerged further down the street than Joy had to run and she and to jump over the thing to get to her building. Inside she hurried past her neighbors, some gathering near the mailboxes near the entrance and others on the stairs, all curious and asking questions about the supposed earthquake.

Joy dodged them all, avoiding their questions so she could get into her flat and lock the door behind her. Tyler, her six month old kitten, was already waiting on the kitchen counter for her, ready to be fed. Much to his disliking, however, Joy instead dropped her gym bag and rushed to turn on her TV. Sure enough, as she found a local news channel, there were already reports, photos, and videos, flooding in about the strange earthquake and the disgusting looking roots sprouting up. The remote fell from her hand as she watched a shaky video from downtown, from what looked to be a lo-fi cell phone, that was filming some sort of twisting tree raise high into the night sky. It was so close, Joy realized, that she could probably see it clearer from the window near her bed. Indeed, as she ran to the window and threw back the curtains she saw the thing towering over the city, with tendril like branches and surrounded by a dense red fog.

The sight both shocked and terrified her at the same time, freezing her in pace with her hands on her curtains and hazel eyes wide. Her mix of emotions were somewhere between awe-struck terror and disgust, and she was stuck like that until she felt her kitten brushing up against her ankles, meowing impatiently while he waited for his dinner.

A rush of knocking came at her front door and it snapped Joy out of her stupor. She turned to look at her door from her place in front of the window. She didn’t make a move to open it until she heard her landlord on the other side yelling her name.

“Mr. Langdon?” she asked, finally moving away from the window and almost tripping over Tyler. She bent low to pick him up before rushing to her door to open it, not even bothering to check the peep hole. When her door swung open, revealing that her landlord had a shotgun in his hands, she wished briefly that she had. “Why—Why do you—?” Joy began to ask, quickly moving away from the door and out of his path.

“Close that window!” he cut her off, nearly running to her window and yanking the curtains closed.

“You have a shot gun?” she questioned him and he turned around to face her, but still looked like he hadn’t heard her question.

“Stay in your apartment and stay quiet. Keep your lights off, and—” he paused to mute her television, “—Keep that quiet.”

“Mr. Langdon, I don’t understand what’s going on,” she tried pressing him as he checked her flat unceremoniously, looking as if he was searching for an intruder. Though it was illegal, Joy didn’t even think about him not being allowed to do what he was doing. “What are you looking for?”

Again, he didn’t answer her. He seemed satisfied that there was no intruder in her apartment and walked back to her by her door. “Stay in your apartment until the Military comes. I’ll check on you again in a couple of hours, I need to get all these other half-wit tenants back in their apartments.”

“The military? Hey,” she tried blocking her doorway to stop her landlord. “What is happening?”

“There’s a demon outbreak, you were just watching it,” he gestured to her now silent TV set. “Don’t open your door for anyone but me or the Military, understood?”

“Yes but...” she agreed, finally stepping aside, unable to quickly process the words “demon outbreak”.

Before she could try to question him further, Mr. – had closed her door behind him, shouting, “Lock your door!” She moved to do just that, setting Tyler on the floor to lock the door knob, deadbolt, and latch the chain. There wasn’t a spare moment for her to stop and think before her phone began buzzing with an emergency alarm in her gym bag. She fished it out of her gym bag quickly and read the alert on the screen, the words “Civil Danger” standing out. It listed her county, as well and only offered the same information her landlord had about staying indoors. There wasn’t even a time frame.  
She closed out the alert then, realizing she had a number of missed calls and dozens of texts. Scrolling through them quickly, she had more from other members of her company asking her to go out drinking before the majority were from her mom and dad asking if she was alright.

Joy moved to her couch then, realizing the majority of her missed calls were also her parents. She tapped on one of the calls to call them back and put the phone to her ear, watching her now muted television. The phone barely rang once before her father picked up.

“Joy? Is that you?”

“Yeah, dad,” she barely had time to answer before he was asking more questions.

“Are you alright? Are you safe?”

“I’m in my apartment— Do you know what’s happening?” she asked, eyes glued to her TV screen as a news film crew was set up in front of a few of the demonic roots and a hole in the ground.

“What was that? Honey, you’re breaking—”

Her phone beeped, letting Joy know the call was dropped and she immediately redialed her father’s number.

“Dad?” she asked as he answered again.

“Joy, I can’t hear you,” his voice came through warbled and she couldn’t understand him at first.

“What? Dad—?”

“Stay—” he was cut off by static.

“Stay what?” she rose her voice as if that would help their connection. “Dad?”

Her phone beeped again, that call also being dropped. When she tried calling a third time her phone immediately failed the call and she saw that she no longer had a signal. Not only that, but she had a slash through her Wi-Fi bars. Joy dropped her phone at her side, her eyes raising to her television again and her mouth fell open. The news crew, as well as bystanders were now being attacked by giant insectoid demons.

She pulled her feet up onto the couch then, hugging her knees to her chest as she watched on like the attack was some horror movie, the demonic roots acting of their own accord and impaling a few bystanders who were trying to flee the scene.

By that time the images were becoming grainy and Joy almost felt relieved as her television blinked out to a blue screen. The images though, of those people being slaughtered by those demonic creatures and the tentacle like roots, it stayed with Joy and she sat unmoving on the couch with only Tyler’s annoyed meowing coming from the kitchen.

As Joy was coming down from her shock and realizing that she should actually do something to stop Tyler from loudly complaining, a shot rang out from outside her door. She jumped in her seat, covering her mouth as she yelped, and her eyes went to the door. After a pause two then three more shots were fired, the distinct sound of a 12 gage. Tyler was no longer in the kitchen, he had ran and jumped onto the back of her couch, perching himself near Joy as he stared at the door with her.

Following the shots were screams and Joy could hear frantic running in the hallway, followed by an odd clicking. With a fourth shot closer to her door, Tyler hissed and ran to Joy’s bed, diving underneath. It was enough to get Joy out of her seat as well and she quickly moved to turn off her television, before running as quietly as possible to her kitchen to turn off the light over her sink.

She was able to turn that light off as well, encasing her flat in darkness, before she heard a rush of footsteps running down her hall way past her door, followed by clicking. She stayed still in the kitchen, watching her door, and jumped when there was a loud thud. Though it was dark, she could see the light through her peep hole disappear for a brief moment. The silence after left her curious and she slowly moved to the door, peeking out into the hallway. The first thing she noticed was the ground covered in blood, and she saw the stock of Mr. Langdon’s shotgun when she moved to the side to try and get a better view of the hallway.

She had to stop herself from gasping as she saw a dark figure pass her door along with more of that clicking she had heard. She rushed back from her door and nearly tripped over her gym bag in doing so, recognizing the horrible figure as one of those insectoid demons. Joy realized suddenly that her kitten Tyler had the right idea in the first place, and she knelt down, pulling her pepper spray out of the bag before rushing to her bed and dropping to the ground. On her stomach, she pushed herself underneath the bed frame, and out of view to hide with Tyler.

\-----

Joy sighed at her empty cabinets. She had scrounged up every last piece of food she could that hadn’t spoiled in her flat. With the demon tree and the subsequent demon infestation, she had lost her running water on day three and her electricity on day seven. By then, she had lost all hope for being evacuated like the emergency broadcasts had indicated.

On day ten, she had resorted to scavenging. At first she was afraid to even venture off of her floor in the building. Those roots had crept up one side, she found, and broke away some of the exterior walls so a few floors, including hers, were completely open to the outside. Because of that there were the occasional demons roaming the halls. Joy’s flat was in the corner furthest from that breach, so barricading her front door and holing up with Tyler and Mr. Langdon’s shotgun in her bathroom kept her safe and unseen.

When her hallway wasn’t being prowled, she would try different apartment doors to see if they were locked. Many still were and Joy wondered if there were other survivors inside, but she was always too nervous to make any sort of sound like knocking or calling out. The apartments that were open were torn apart already, or had petrified humans inside. Joy tried to ignore them as she grabbed whatever she could from the pantries and fridges. Water was the hardest to come by, but she had been able to find cases of it bottled, or boxes and bottles of juice and sports drinks. The past week Joy’s diet had consisted solely of one can of ravioli a day. She had found a dozen or so cans of it in one of her neighbor’s flats and at the time it felt like a godsend.

She had no way to cook any of the food she found since her electricity went. Sometime around day twenty, she had thought of trying to light a fire in her flat, but was afraid she would set the whole building ablaze, or that the smoke would attract unwanted attention from the demons.

Now, on day thirty one, she was desperate for something to drink. She had rationed out a thirty ounce bottle of Gatorade over three days. Over the same three days, she gave up her last cup of water to Tyler, only giving him a few sips at a time. To make matters worse, he only had about a day or two left of food, since she hadn’t been rationing for him. He was already upset with her over the water as it was.

Joy’s plan was to head to the closest grocery store, about half a block away, and hope that the place wasn’t already looted by others survivors or, worse, infested by the demons. She hadn’t gathered up the courage to leave her building before, but she had no choice now. Since Tyler had an uncanny ability to hide whenever a demon was in the building she was planning on taking him with her. Even when Joy couldn’t hear it skulking around outside, he’d alert her with a quick hiss before bolting into the bathroom to hide. Hopefully he’d do the same for her on the streets, minus the bolting. The last thing she needed was a missing kitten on top of everything else. To combat that, she had planned on swaddling up Tyler in one of her bedsheets and securing him to her chest, like how a mother would normally carry her infant.

The kitten didn’t complain as he was fastened into place, before she threw on a hooded overcoat. Something about drawing a hood over her head made her feel more safe, in case she did run into anyone she knew. No one would recognize her criminal looting, and no one would track her back to her flat and take what she still had. When she had Mr. Langdon’s shotgun strapped to her back, Joy was physically ready. Mentally, however, she was not. It wasn’t so much the law breaking or possible encounter with other unsavory humans, but the demons that were scaring her from setting foot outside her apartment. Joy wasn’t fooling herself, the shotgun couldn’t do much harm a demon, if anything shooting one would only cause a distraction at best. At worst, it would just draw more attention to her.

Day would be breaking soon, and Joy didn’t have much of an option left, leave now while she could still hide in shadows, or wait through another day with absolutely nothing to drink, for her or Tyler. Glancing down to Tyler, his white and black head poking out from the sheets and her coat, she pet him with a sigh before reaching for her door knob. As expected from her kitten’s calm demeanor, the hall was dark and deserted. Joy stepped out, closing the door behind her and stood in the silence, straining her ears for any sound, but found none. Only then did she creep down the stairwell to the ground floor of her building and out into the deserted street. The demon root that had broke through the street had grown in size, and had tendrils woven throughout parked cars and street lamps.

Joy moved quickly down the sidewalk, keeping her steps light and silent, while clutching Tyler beneath her jacket and holding her empty gym bag tightly in her other hand. Even while cautious and silent, Joy still made it to the grocery store in record time versus her previous lazy Sunday night walks. Thankfully, she had been able to avoid any potentially disastrous scenarios. She hadn’t even seen a demon on her way to the store.

Before entering, she scoped it out, watching the dark windows for any signs of life or movement. One of the glass swing doors had been shattered and Joy feared that the place may already be empty, but still used that as her entrance instead of pulling the front doors open and risking an alarm.

Though dark, Joy didn’t have much trouble navigating the store and found that her initial worries were for naught, the store was largely untouched except for a few aisles with the canned and non perishable food. If anything, Joy wasn’t the only survivor in the city, at least she wasn’t before.

Joy’s first stop was the bottled water, almost forgetting that she was trying to be stealthy as she reached for the most expensive bottle she found still on the shelves and gulped half of it down, just because she could. Making sure her gym bag was secure over her shoulder, she opened up her jacket so Tyler could poke her head out. After, she removed the bottle from her own lips and cupped her hand to give Tyler a much needed drink as well, not worrying about the water spilling out onto the ground. There were still a good amount of water bottles, and she could worry about rationing when she was safe in her apartment.

When Tyler pulled away from her hand, Joy drank the remains of the water before placing the empty bottle back on the shelf and wiping her wet had on her thigh. She loaded what she could into her gym bag, quickly realizing that she couldn’t carry half of what she wanted to due to the sheer weight. She hadn’t even stopped by the food yet. Joy forced herself out of the water aisle and towards the canned food aisle. The first thing she picked up was a can of tuna fish. Immediately she peeled the lid back, drained as much water as possible onto the floor, and then shared the fish with Tyler, who happily ate from her palm. While he ate, she made a mental note to grab him more kitten food as well.

After collecting most of the tuna fish cans on the shelf before her, Joy moved on to other canned goods, feeling her shoulder ache from the weight of her bag. If she was careful, Joy had at least another two weeks of food, and she now knew she could make it here without incident. Adjusting her bag’s straps over her shoulder, Joy headed to the opposite end of the grocery store, making for the pet food aisle. She was briefly distracted by the snack aisle, mainly by the expensive chocolates and snack nuts. She even grabbed a few boxes of crackers in hopes of the canned soup she grabbed being more palatable cold. When she finally got herself to the pet food aisle she found it mostly untouched and grabbed as many kitten food trays as she could stuff into her bag.

Joy had to kneel down to zip the bag up, setting it on the ground to try and shove everything into place. Just as she got the gym bag zipped up, she heard a bell sound through the silence of the store, like the ones attached to the tops of shop doors…

Suddenly hyper aware, Joy froze while still kneeling on the ground, listening for some indication of who or what had just entered the store. Just as she thought maybe she was hearing things, or that the bell had gone off on it’s own somehow, Tyler let out a hiss and started wriggling frantically in his swaddle of bedsheets under her coat. Quickly, Joy placed her hand over his face before completely concealing him in the coat once more. She realized that he was letting her know whatever had came into the store definitely wasn’t human. While Joy was struggling to get Mr. Langdon’s shotgun into her hands and her gym bag over her shoulder, Joy could hear clicking from those insectoid demons walking around. By the sounds of it, there had to be more than one, but it didn’t sound like they knew she was inside, it sounded like aimless wandering.

Joy turned around in the aisle, looking to the larger cans of dog food and picked one up in her hand, feeling it’s weight. If she could distract them, get them to move away from the entrance, she could try to slip out unnoticed. Moving quickly to the front of the aisle, Joy turned and threw the can of dog food as hard as she could towards the opposite end. It hit a display of chew toys, causing it to fall over with a clamor of squeaking and plastic hitting the tile. It was enough for the demon’s to pick up their pace and Joy glanced out towards the entrance of the store, finding it clear. She didn’t wait for the demons to find the knocked over display, she just bolted for the doors, no longer worried about stealth.

When Joy thought she was getting away with her looting scot free, she watched a large, dark figure walk into her path on all fours. Despite the dark, Joy easily made out the sleek form of a panther, and watched it stop and look directly to her with glowing, magenta colored eyes. Joy skid immediately to a halt, brain failing to process what exactly was happening before she felt Tyler’s claws sink into the skin of her chest through the bed sheet and her tank top, prompting her to react.

Taking a step back, Joy understood that the panther must be another form of demon from the evil, glowing eye color. Before she could make a mad dash into another aisle to try and lose this new threat, she saw two of the insectoid demons behind her. Instead of stopping again, she dove into one of the checkout lanes on her right. Fortunately, the panther was preoccupied with the two insects to bother following Joy. Unfortunately, she lost her balance and both the gym bag as well as her shotgun went skidding across the tile floor as she fell.

“Shit, shit!” she cursed, ignoring the burn of Tyler’s claws in her chest as she scrambled back to her feet. She grabbed the shotgun first before grabbing for the strap to her gym bag, as she pulled it towards her, she watched the sharp leg of a third insectoid demon step on the bag, tearing it open and scattering everything she had just scavenged.

Reflexively she shot the demon with the shotgun, near point blank, and was unprepared for the kick back. Immediately, Joy felt her shoulder bruise and lost every sound but a sharp ring in her ears. As she had expected, Mr. Langdon’s shotgun had done little more than stagger the demon, but it was enough for her to turn around a run, leaving her gym bag and most everything she had needed for survival. She was able to kick a liter of water and a few trays of kitten food towards the door. She exited the same way she had come, not bothering to open the door. As she left, she scooped up the water and trays of kitten food, not willing to leave with absolutely nothing.

Outside the grocery store, she could see much better due to the early dawn, the sky a pale pink and blotted with mauve clouds. Unfortunately, her escape rout back to her flat was crowded by two more insectoid demons. Joy quickly thought to turn around and eventually circle back to her building but a sudden flash of red lightening caused her to pause in recoil. She stood still long enough to notice a large, eagle sized and cobalt blue bird flying overhead, summoning the bolts that were striking the demons.

Joy only watched the demon bird for another second before turning around. Again she was struck paralyzed by an odd sight. There was a man in the middle of the road, a book in one hand and a silver cane in the other, just staring back at her. Panting, she took in his appearance, dark coat and hair, and black tattoos covering his body from the tips of his fingers to his neck and down his torso. She took a step back, turning around to look at the bird attacking the demons, and saw that the panther had joined it. Instead of running towards the man, she saw an opening on the opposite end of the street from the panther, eagle, and insectoid demons, and decided it was a safer rout, breaking out into a full sprint back to her flat.

\-----

V looked up from his book to Griffon, perched on a street sign near the bench he was sat upon. Pacing back and forth between them was Shadow, vocalizing low growls. “What’s wrong?” he asked the thunderbird.

“She’s saying there’s a human somewhere nearby. I say she’s imagining things,” the bird complained back to him and Shadow bared her fangs to the bird.

“And?” V pressed after glancing back and forth between the pair.

“It’s alive. But that’s impossible. This tree, Qliphoth, it’s killed everything in the city. No way is something as frail as a human still alive. It’s been a month!”

V smirked at the bird, “Thank you for your faith in humans.”

“You know what I mean. And it’s not like she has familiars protecting her like you, Shakespeare,” Griffon argued.

“Her?” V questioned, his smirk falling into a confused frown.

“Shadow says it’s a woman,” Griffon explained and Shadow stopped pacing to stare into him with her red eyes, as if she were trying to relay what she was sensing directly to him instead of through Griffon.

“Well?” he asked the panther, before snapping his book shut. He gripped his cane, using it to help himself stand before continuing, “Where is she?”

“Wait, you can’t really be serious. You want to waste time on this? Where are you going?” Griffon left the street sign with a mighty flap of his wings and began following V and Shadow.

“To find this woman. You said yourself, that everything else is dead. Where is she?” V followed Shadow, his cane clicking on the pavement.

“She’s… grocery shopping?! V,” Griffon flew around so he was in front of V. “Shadow got knocked around too hard in that last fight, she’s hallucinating. She says the human is inside a grocery store up ahead. Look, are we really wasting time on this? We still have a job to do for—”

“Urizen isn’t going anywhere. Neither is that tree,” V pointed at the tree looming over the city with the end of his cane. “He can wait.”

“Yeah but what about that kid, Nero? Will he wait too? We’re late to meet him.”

“If he’s any more patient than his uncle, he will wait. If not,” V shrugged, “I’m sure he’ll find something… nearby to occupy him. Shadow, show Griffon where this human is.” V stopped, tapping his cane on the ground Shadow melded into a cloud of black smoke around his feet.

“Yeah, right. Is that saying ‘Curiosity killed the cat’ in that fancy book of yours?” Griffon didn’t stick around for V to answer, instead he turned and lead the way to the grocery store. The thunderbird was already engaging a couple of Empusa outside the store and V slowed to a stop so he could pull out his book. Shadow reformed instantly, but she ran into the store instead of helping Griffon.

V watched her disappear before peering down onto the open page of his book. Before he could read the first word, a gunshot caught his attention and he glanced up once more, peering into the dark store. V followed shadows moving inside until a human woman crawled out of the bottom of a broken glass door, clutching a water bottle and a few trays of wet cat food to her chest.

Still holding his book in his left hand and his cane in his right, he stopped walking towards Griffon and the two Empusas to stare, his head tilting in confusion at her strange antics. She had started for the thunderbird and demons but looked deterred by the fight. Instead she skid to a halt and started backwards before turning around and facing him. The moment her eyes met his she stopped again, staring back at him. She looked… maybe ruined was too poetic of a word. Her hazel eyes were sunken deep in her skull and surrounded by dark circles, her cheeks were gaunt, her lips were dry, her brunette hair was unwashed, and she had an odd lump on her chest that was moving beneath her hooded coat.

In a silent question, V rose a dark eyebrow at her, but received no response. Instead she turned and ran the original way she was headed, slipping past the two Empusas while Griffon, had them distracted. She looked frightened, like something about him was much worse than the two horrific insect-like demons and thunderbird summoning red lightening out of thin air.

Shadow was next out of the grocery store, pausing to give V a look as if to say “I told you so” before she ran and pounced on one of the Empusas.

“Shadow, follow her,” V commanded, shoving his book back in his coat and rushing to stab the end of his cane through the demon she had tackled. Having sent her off, V didn’t have any other ground support to deal with two more Empusas that had scurried out of the grocery store. “Griffon!” he called then, reaching up and grabbing onto the bird’s talons as he swooped past. “Don’t lose them,” he instructed as he was lifted off the ground and Griffon did as instructed, carrying him off the way Shadow and the woman had run off.

“This is a terrible idea, and a huge waste of time. If the boss found out—”

“He won’t,” V stopped him.

When the pair were far enough away, Griffon set V on the ground before flying higher to try and spot where Shadow was. “She just ran into a building not far from here,” he descended far enough to tell V. “Follow me, Shakespeare.”

The thunderbird led V to the building he mentioned about five minutes later, and it turned out to be an older apartment building, half taken over by Qliphoth’s roots. As V entered the building, Griffon followed, diving down through the open doorway before disappearing into black smoke, settling on V’s skin in intricate patterns. Since the lift didn’t look like it was powered, V took the stairs, his cane clicking on each step as he climbed, until he found Shadow. The panther was laying outside of an apartment door on the fourth floor, her tail flicking idly. She sat up when V approached and she stayed  
sitting next to the door as V tried the handle. It was locked firmly, he couldn’t even move the door.Looking from the handle and back to Shadow, she knew what to do almost immediately with no direction. Much like Griffon had, she faded into a formless black smoke that seeped through the cracks of the door. From the outside, V heard the locks undoing and it was a matter of a few seconds before the door swung open on its own. Shadow was back in her form, prowling around the small studio flat, and V took in its disheveled appearance. There were several cans of ravioli set out and stacked on the kitchen counter, with several more empty cans and plastic containers surrounding them. There was a couch and a television stand near the front door that looked like they had been used to barricade the doorway but had been moved to the side. There was also a mattress and bed frame turned up on its side against the far wall, and V assumed it was blocking a window. In the middle of the floor was the same hooded coat the woman had been wearing, as if she had thrown it off, along with the mattresses sheets, blankets, and pillows.

Shadow had stopped her pacing and was standing before a closed door that V guessed to be a bathroom. He stepped into the apartment then, nodding once as he walked towards the bathroom door. Once again, Shadow was only smoke and forced herself into the bathroom. As V reached the door he could hear a frantic scramble from inside, and was met with the barrel of the woman’s shotgun when it opened. He stayed standing, unfazed, as Shadow seeped into his skin with Griffon, darkening his tattoos. Instead, a look of curiosity and astonishment crept into his eyes while the barrel shifted up from his collarbone to his face. This woman, however she had survived, was trying to look intimidating but she was visibly trembling as she stood before him.

He wanted to ask what she was doing, how she had survived for a month, if there were other survivors, but all of his words got stuck in his throat. “Get out,” she spoke first with a voice that was just as intimidating as she looked.

“You’re bleeding,” he responded, not bothering to move from his spot in the bathroom doorway. Though he tried keeping his eyes on her face, he couldn’t help but notice the dried blood on her chest, stemming from small scratches and puncture marks. She was in a pair of jean shorts and a thin white tank top, that had absorbed some of the dried blood, and for some reason V found it hard to keep focused on her face.

“Are you one of them?” she asked him, ignoring his statement.

For the sake of making conversation with this woman easier, while her shotgun was still shoved in his face, he tried answering her. “One of what?”

“ _Them_ ,” she stressed, finally lowering her gun. “Are you with _them_?”

Did she mean the Empusas? Qliphoth? Were there more humans that were harassing her? In either case his answer was the same. “No,” he responded simply.

She heaved, almost like she was about to cry while the shotgun fell to the tiled floor. Soon after she joined it, collapsing with her knees up to her chest and her back against her bathtub. V watched her before looking to the shotgun, and then finding a small black and white cat staring up at him with green eyes matching his own.

“Are you alone?” V asked, looking back to her. She only nodded, running her hands through her hair as she tried fixing her bun, using her fingers to detangle the brunette strands.

“How’d you get in like that?” she asked him then, but before V could think of trying to explain Shadow or his other familiars to her, she frantically added, “Did you leave the door open?” Again he didn’t have time to answer, he barely had enough time to move out of her way and she bolted out of the bathroom and slammed her front door shut, quickly locking it before dragging the TV stand in front of it.  
“How are you still here? In the city?” he decided to ignore her last inquiries, like she was ignoring his, wondering why it was so hard for him to talk to her at all. He didn’t have this trouble talking to Nero or Dante, why was this woman any different?

“No one ever came by, you’re the first person I’ve seen that’s still alive,” she answered without bothering to stop what she was doing. Once the TV stand was in place, she started trying to move the couch by herself.

“Do you need help?” he asked, wondering the same question about himself. Did he need help talking to her? Why hadn’t William Blake wrote a poem about finding a woman in a demon infested city?

“Grab the other end of the couch,” she mistook his offer of help and he quickly corrected her.

“No… um,” he started, still feeling his words getting jumbled in his throat. He rubbed at his forehead quickly with his left hand and watched her look up to him finally before her eyes lowered to his cane.

“Oh,” she looked back to his face but V didn’t understand what that was supposed to mean.

“I meant to ask if you needed help to get out of the city,” V clarified as much as he could, his left hand falling from his forehead.

She stood straight with her hazel eyes boring into him and this time, without her shotgun even, V felt the urge to recoil from her. “You?” she questioned. It didn’t sound demeaning in the least, her voice was more or less shocked that he had offered. “You can get me out of the city?”

“Yes,” he answered.

“That cat was you? And the bird?” she questioned further and he tightened his grip on his cane.

“Yes,” he said again.

“Where are they now?” she asked, crossing her arms over her bloodied tank top, she had yet to do anything about the small cuts on her chest though the blood was completely dried.

He inhaled sharply, his head tilting slightly as he answered, saving himself a long explanation. “Nearby.”

“And this isn’t a trick?” she rose one of her eyebrows and that gesture made him impulsively want to smile at her. Instead he suppressed it.

“No. No tricks.” The woman was silent, staring at him again but he was distracted by something small and soft pressing itself between his bare ankles. He quickly looked down and saw the small black and white cat rubbing along his legs. It was purring, a small and quiet sound compared to what he had heard from Shadow.

“Alright,” she said and he looked up from the cat to her, only for her to be watching at the cat now as well. “Give me a few minutes,” she only glanced at him before walking past to her closet.

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers starting after this chapter if you haven't seen the cut scene after the Demo, but I mean the game itself is out in 9 days so... :)
> 
> Also I'm not entirely happy with this but if I want to get it mostly out before the game next weekend I don't have much of a choice. That means this might be edited later on.


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